Shaping Your Baby's Foundation

A revolutionary work that guides new parents in helping their baby form healthy movements, strong muscles, and a fit body during the child’s critical first year of life, filled with vital information and over 400 full-color photographs that clearly show how to create a strong foundation for a baby’s musculoskeletal health and future wellness

A child’s first steps are one of the great miracles in life—one we think of as a natural, essential, intuitive process. But just as new parents foster positive digestive, emotional, and intellectual growth, we cannot leave it to nature and instinct alone to ensure that infants develop the strong musculoskeletal foundation they need.
Little bodies are malleable: nerves are elongating, bones are hardening, muscles are strengthening—newborns are a never-ending process of physical change. The problem is that the car seat, the bouncer, the carrier, the crib, the pack-n-play—the very devices modern parents depend on for hands-free parenting—leave that precious developing bundle at the mercy of gravity and passive, bodyweight-based alignment.
Shaping Your Baby’s Foundation gives new parents the information they need to safely and effectively build their baby’s muscle tone, strengthen the child’s growing body, and set their newborn on the path for a lifetime of wellness. Shaping Your Baby’s Foundation isn’t about hitting milestones (for example, walking early can mean a child missed some key areas of strengthening at earlier stages), it’s about growing well. Jen Goodman gives parents the tools they need to give their baby a body that will be strong and balanced by the time the child is vertical. By helping a baby meet gravity’s challenges during the first year of life, this book vastly increases the chances of that baby later remaining strong, fit, and healthy as a toddler, teen, and adult.
Written in Goodman’s gentle and accessible, yet authoritative, voice, and aided by over 400 full-color photographs to guide parents step-by-step through the first year of their baby’s life, Shaping Your Baby’s Foundation is a revolutionary parenting bible for a new generation.

Reviews

“Shaping Your Baby’s Foundation provides a guaranteed path of getting things right from the start—a gift for life. I have no doubt this book will become the standard text, the must-read for every new parent, grandparent, and pediatrician, not to mention physiotherapists who have to fix physical errors down the line. A landmark book.” — Dr. Joan Vernikos PhD, chair of the Taksha Institute for Space, Health, and Aging, former director of Life Sciences for NASA, and author of The G-Connection and Stress Fitness for Seniors“We’ve ignored children’s innate reflexes to move abundantly for far too long. Shaping Your Baby's Foundation is an essential guide that will help parents and alloparents to cultivate these reflexes and better meet an infant’s critical need to move.” — Katy Bowman, MS, bestselling author of Grow Wild: The Whole-Child, Whole-Family, Nature-Rich Guide to Moving More“A parent is akin to a guide, shepherding our children toward success. The foundation of movement is cemented very early on and requires parents to relearn the basic building blocks in order to set the stage for future movement competency. Caregivers, you won’t want to miss Shaping Your Baby’s Foundation.” — Dr. Steven Capobianco, DC, DACRB, CSCS, medical director of Rocktape“A well-organized clearinghouse of evidence-based, vitally important but surprisingly uncomplicated practical information. My most recommended, must-have book for every new family . . . and for the healthcare team that is charged with offering the best in education, care, guidelines, and support!”  — Dr. Tim Brown, DC, co-medical director, World Surf League(Northern Hemisphere); Performance and Recovery Team, USA Surfing; creator of Specific Proprioceptive Response Techniques (SPRT)“An encyclopedia. A companion. A baby-whisperer that every parent/caretaker needs to supportively coach us into knowledgeably helping our littles. Shaping Your Baby’s Foundation arrives at a critical moment for us culturally as we must aid our newest generation to abate the pain crisis that has overtaken the world. You’ll want to get this book into the grasping hands of every baby’s family at once. It nurtures and empowers each family member to make better choices as individuals, families, and community.” — Jill Miller, author of The Roll Model, cofounder of Tune Up Fitness